Outages hit 21,300 throughout Maine

Rain, heavy wet snow and high winds left about 21,300 Bangor Hydro and Central Maine Power customers without electricity for portions of the weekend as the first onset of ugly wintry weather hit Maine, meteorologists and utility company officials said Sunday.

The 21,300 outages were scattered statewide among Bangor Hydro and CMP and occurred mostly on Saturday with Central Maine customers. CMP utility crews restored power to all but 2,800 customers by dawn Sunday, just in time for another bout of high winds and wet snow to knock power out to about 4,900 Central Maine customers, mostly in Oxford, Piscataquis and Somerset counties, by mid-Sunday morning, officials said.

Central Maine Power expected to restore power to customers in all areas by midnight Sunday.

More than 3,000 Bangor Hydro customers in Hancock, Penobscot and Washington counties were without electricity for portions of Saturday. Customers in Bangor, Bowerbank, Charleston, Dedham, Hermon, Milford, Old Town, Orono and Orrington among other communities reported most of the outages at about 2:30 p.m.

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Bangor Hydro repair crews had restored power to all but about 130 customers within an hour, company spokeswoman Susan Faloon said.

“I assume it was the wind and rain that caused it,” Faloon said.

No significant Bangor Hydro outages were reported Sunday, she said.

Rain, snow and gusts of up to 45 mph hit Aroostook, Hancock, Penobscot, Piscataquis, Somerset and Washington counties, according to a high winds advisory issued by the National Weather Service in Caribou. The highest gust, 50 mph, in the area was reported in Greenville.

“Most of the high winds have already occurred today,” said Lee Foster, a meteorologist with the weather service in Caribou, said Saturday.

In most of Piscataquis County 3 to 6 inches of snow fell, and the Quebec-Maine border got as much as 6 inches of snow in the first accumulation for November, Foster said. The snow is definitely a harbinger of things to come.

“The pattern is definitely shifting to more winterlike weather that will continue into December,” Foster said.

Another 2 to 4 inches of snow is expected in northern Maine by Monday night, he said.